Impossible is Werlin’s take on the ballad “Scarborough Fair,” which has had numerous versions throughout time but mostly concerns itself with two main points–a young man asks of his love to do three impossible tasks, and the young girl requests the same of him. Impossible is a modern take on it, cursing the women of the Scarborough clan to either get those tasks done or become a lunatic after they have a kid.
To be up front, I don’t agree that this book is appropriate for anyone under the age of fourteen. The publisher labels this as appropriate for 12 and up, but there is a mighty big difference in understanding between a 12-year-old and 14-year-old. The subject matter, of how Lucy gets pregnant and the ensuing pregnancy itself, is a mature theme that is far more suited for high school than primary school.
Chances are readers will have heard of the ballad “Scarborough Fair” and probably heard it at least once in their lives. It’s taught in a great many schools as part of the medieval literature in English classes, actually. The book follows an older version, involving an Elf and the curse he laid upon the family for an ancestor’s mistake. The book didn’t always manage to seamlessly blend the ballad and the story itself together; the advantages that Lucy has (her foster family, her friend Zach) are sometimes detrimental, in fact.
As Lucy struggles to complete the three tasks, she also has to struggle with pregnancy at seventeen, the change in attitude that classmates and people she has known for years show her, and her own uncertain feelings for the future. She doesn’t want to become like her mother–abandoning her baby and then becoming a crazy bag lady, but she isn’t sure that she can do right by the child, either. Later, when her relationship with Zach changes, and she learns the truth of what happened that night with Gary (the father of her child), she grows more determined.
It was hard to remember that this was a fantasy, or at least touted as one by the publisher. Other than the curse and the Elfin Knight, there wasn’t the traditional sense of “fantasy” one expects. In fact, if you ignored the Elfin Knight, this could have been a contemporary, non-fantasy young adult book about teen pregnancy and the consequences thereafter. Lucy’s struggles with the curse can be seen as mirror images to the struggles that real life teen mothers face.
It’s hard to say if I enjoyed this book or not in the end. I liked the fact it incorporated the ballad, and I liked that it spoke so earnestly about teen pregnancy and didn’t make Lucy uber-teen mom of the year. She made mistakes, she acknowledged that the road was going to be hard as she tried to stay in school and raise her daughter at the same time, but she also understood she had support from people who loved her. I think in the end, though, the two elements together didn’t work out for me.
I’d love you to read mine sometime. Sharon